Thursday, March 29, 2012
Wednesday, March 21, 2012
The new age Work- life balance - Times Accent
In college we were a batch of 40 girls. Of which only 10 are still working and even lesser number of them are working to their full potential. A common thread that runs through any woman’s life is – she studies, works for a few years, gets married, continues working, has a child and that’s where the thorns start pricking in a bed of roses.
The challenges of motherhood conquer every other hurdle a woman has faced. Some look for part time jobs, others start working after the baby begins school and yet the tug of war remains.
They are what I call the ‘Parenting career woman’. These women face the perennial dilemma of - 'I need to make these choices because my family is a priority' or 'I need to make these choices to make my life work.' Eventually they pick one.
I have always come across stereotypical issues coming in the way of a woman while taking a call on their career. It is easy to get swept away by the overwhelming need to choose one – profession or managing a home. It is their own ghosts and mindsets that come in the way of work-life balance.
But there are also women who have kept working even after having children, taken a break for them and continued to climb the corporate ladder after the break. The societal understanding of marriage as a threat to career or vice versa is slowly changing.
Here are some tips that suits most of us:
1) Set your priorities. You have to have a schedule for yourself. That includes work, family time and time for your own self.
2) Don’t give up too easily. Some people also look for less important roles, as women don’t necessarily want to get to the top; they want to be good at what they do.
3) Slow down or even take a break if the juggle is too much to handle. Enhance your skills in the meantime, so that when you return the organization cannot overlook you.
4) Big job is too big for me syndrome – Most women feel that they will not be able to handle the top job as it comes with bigger responsibilities. What they forget is that with higher responsibilities comes empowerment. Look for ways to lighten the load by delegating work and focus on the most important deliveries.
Once Jack Welch of General Electric had said, “There’s no such thing as work-life balance. There are work-life choices, and you make them, and they have consequences.” It is however true for both men and women.
Work life balance for women can be dealt with. It just needs some reflection of women on their life with some support from organizations.
Reduced aspirations do not mean women employees are not talented or good at what they do. While women are given flexible working hours, stay at home options – they should also be judged by their output and results. It should not be about ‘where she is working from’; it should be about ‘what she is delivering’.
In today’s 24x7 connected business world, work can be done from anywhere and at any time. It does not have to mean that an employee works less. Instead it means that organizations are empowering employees to do their work on a schedule that works for both. So what if she is working from her dining table? This kind of flexibility increases employee morale and woman executives are able to manage their life and career well.
The challenges of motherhood conquer every other hurdle a woman has faced. Some look for part time jobs, others start working after the baby begins school and yet the tug of war remains.
They are what I call the ‘Parenting career woman’. These women face the perennial dilemma of - 'I need to make these choices because my family is a priority' or 'I need to make these choices to make my life work.' Eventually they pick one.
I have always come across stereotypical issues coming in the way of a woman while taking a call on their career. It is easy to get swept away by the overwhelming need to choose one – profession or managing a home. It is their own ghosts and mindsets that come in the way of work-life balance.
But there are also women who have kept working even after having children, taken a break for them and continued to climb the corporate ladder after the break. The societal understanding of marriage as a threat to career or vice versa is slowly changing.
Here are some tips that suits most of us:
1) Set your priorities. You have to have a schedule for yourself. That includes work, family time and time for your own self.
2) Don’t give up too easily. Some people also look for less important roles, as women don’t necessarily want to get to the top; they want to be good at what they do.
3) Slow down or even take a break if the juggle is too much to handle. Enhance your skills in the meantime, so that when you return the organization cannot overlook you.
4) Big job is too big for me syndrome – Most women feel that they will not be able to handle the top job as it comes with bigger responsibilities. What they forget is that with higher responsibilities comes empowerment. Look for ways to lighten the load by delegating work and focus on the most important deliveries.
Once Jack Welch of General Electric had said, “There’s no such thing as work-life balance. There are work-life choices, and you make them, and they have consequences.” It is however true for both men and women.
Work life balance for women can be dealt with. It just needs some reflection of women on their life with some support from organizations.
Reduced aspirations do not mean women employees are not talented or good at what they do. While women are given flexible working hours, stay at home options – they should also be judged by their output and results. It should not be about ‘where she is working from’; it should be about ‘what she is delivering’.
In today’s 24x7 connected business world, work can be done from anywhere and at any time. It does not have to mean that an employee works less. Instead it means that organizations are empowering employees to do their work on a schedule that works for both. So what if she is working from her dining table? This kind of flexibility increases employee morale and woman executives are able to manage their life and career well.
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
From having a boss to becoming one: Business Standard March 2012
Intro: More and more women are becoming entrepreneurs and bringing in their edge to work for them
Anisha Motwani
Whenever I see the idol of goddess Durga, it reminds me of the fact that women have played multiple roles not only since ages but even in our religious scriptures.
Women know how to double up a spoon as a knife; they know when the man says “I am alright” it means, “just leave me alone”; at work women know who can really deliver and when the need comes women make a quick switch from working for others to being their own boss. All this, while being the nurturing mother and caring wife, all rolled into one.
I do not mean to start the clichéd debate of women and men here. What I want to point out is the way women know how to adapt to situations. The society is going through what I call a metamorphosis of sorts. Nuclear families today are becoming bigger reality than they ever were. And women are proving it yet again that they are adapting and accepting to that change. The change is reflected in the way women want to function today.
Women aspired for corporate careers keen to break many a glass ceilings. But then realities of life catch up. Women get married; a few years down the line have children. And that is when the consequences and problems of a nuclear family impact them. It’s quite possible that while going on their maternity leave they’d marked their calendar on when they want to join back work. But then, life changes.
Corporate careers are demanding. And though there are some corporates doing a lot to make women employees feel comfortable with incentives like extended maternity, half day half pay etc., the reality is that when these women get back to their workplaces, they are torn between being a performing mom or a performing executive.
This is the inflection point that forces them to introspect - at crucial crossroads of life, forced to make a choice between being with the children or getting back to a full time career. Even though advertisers have smartly used the syndrome by giving women ‘ideas’ to manage a job and child – on ground realities are not as smooth as the film.
Innovative as they are, many women have found a solution to the desire of being a good mum, wife and be financially independent. Small or big, women are taking to entrepreneurship that gives them the flexibility of working when, where and how they want. Like they say, ‘Necessity is the mother of all inventions’; some of the best known entrepreneur’s that have emerged are from ‘post-partum syndrome’.
Take for instance Saundarya Rajesh of Avtaar Career Creators. After working in Citi Bank for a number of years, Saundarya quit her job after she had her child. She started teaching MBA students and that’s when she realised that likje her there were many who wanted to do something with ‘flexi-hours’. Her primary goal was to provide career opportunities to people with unique situation in life (women with breaks in career, elderly folks who still had half a decade of service in them post-retirement) required to be presented as an alternate talent source to organisations. Today the company works with more than 400 clients.
Offbeat is the new beat
Recently, I read and interesting article about Dolly Jain. An intelligent young girl who was married off early into a family where women only wear saris. A careful dresser, she always got noticed for the way she carried off herself. Then, on a usual day, she helped somebody in her locality to tie a sari. Soon some more came for help. Then an accidental workshop and before she knew, she had a fulltime, offbeat profession as a sari draper. She loves what she does and has even got featured in Limca Book of Records for the number of styles she can tie a sari in. Her high-profile client list include women like Kokila Ambani and Neeta Ambani to Mrs Rahul Bajaj to Mittals to Jindals to our Bollywood divas (from Sridevi to Katrina Kaif and Kangana Ranaut), to innumerable women and girls.
What they probably draw their drive and innovations from, is the situations they usually go through as a woman. Take for example a typical situation where a recipe book mentions a certain ingredient. While a man would have gone on in a very usual way of finding that particular ingredient, a woman will think out of the box and look for an ingredient close to the recipe or may be just give it her own twist.
And that is exactly what they are doing in today’s time of nuclear families. They want to be around for their family and yet have their financial independence.
Second to none
What probably makes women good entrepreneurs I think is the fact that they have an inborn talent of managing people and situations and multitasking with perfect ease.
Women I feel are the power drivers for entrepreneurial rise. A study entitled ‘Growing role of women Entrepreneur in India’, by Peter F Drucker points out , “Women owned businesses are highly increasing in the economies of almost all countries The hidden entrepreneurial potentials of women have gradually been changing with the growing sensitivity to the role economic status in the society. Skill Knowledge adaptability in business are the main reason for women to take up entrepreneurship. They span generations and are there in every field. From Tractors to television from biscuits to banking from HR to hospitals Denied entry into a male bastion they create another industry like Kiran Mazumdar Shaw of Biocon. According to her hard work commitment and caring in word and deed helps people overcome obstacles.”
The societal change
What strikes me most about achievers is their inclusive approach. If they grow, they don’t grow alone.
In fact I’d say the women entrepreneurs must be considered in the economic development of the nation for various reasons. No wonder women entrepreneurs are now being recognised as an important untapped source of economic growth.
Little surprise in the first half of 2011, women angel investors represented 12 percent of the angel market, and women-owned businesses accounted for 12 percent of the entrepreneurs seeking angel capital. While these numbers aren’t outstanding, they do represent progress. More impressive is that 26 percent of the women entrepreneurs seeking angel investment in the first half of the year received it. In fact, the report notes, the percentage of women actually getting angel investments is above the overall average.
Women Entrepreneurs, points our Drucker “tend to be highly motivated and self directed. They also exhibit a high internal locus of control and achievement, possess certain specific characteristics that promote their creativity and generate new ideas and ways of doing things.”
Why we have success stories written in our own country. Look at Shahnaz Husain. A young girl from a traditional family, who was married at the age of 15, emerged from a sheltered life and upbringing, to step into the world of business. She had the will and let nothing come in her way. She started a small parlour from her home four decades ago with a borrowed capital of Rs 35,000 from her father. When the business she decided to get into franchise system and help other women grow. Like she said in an online interview of Business Standard, “A woman manages her different roles of wife, housewife, mother and career woman efficiently. She brings to the work the values of patience, courage, inner strength. The woman’s ability to adapt and adjust is important at work.”
I couldn’t agree more.
Thursday, March 8, 2012
Maharanis of Marketing - An International Women's Day Special
Anisha Motwani is the Director and Chief Marketing Officer at Max New York Life Insurance. As part of our ongoing series on the importance of technology for marketers and the hunt for tech savvy CMOs in the M.IT.R Top 50 list we caught up with Anisha and got her views on how they have used technology in their various marketing programmes. Read on for the complete interview
How important is technology for the success of the modern marketer?
AM: To answer that question, let’s first see the Indian scenario for technology related progress. India’s total number of internet users is 112 million. Mobile penetration has reached 64.7%. Popularity of social networking sites has reached an all time high. The face of the consumer is changing as they are becoming more technology savvy. The amount of data that is available is exponentially increasing, so from a marketer’s perspective, data analytics is becoming the key. Hence technology will become increasingly important for a marketer to define its marketing strategy.
It is very important for organisations to use technology to understand customer preference and behaviour. At Max New York Life, we use technology to track customer complaints online; we have leveraged technology to move from a policyholder to customer view. We have used social media effectively and created a strong online community with 3Lac+ users engaging with the brand and seeking advice online with expert views available to them as well. On the company website, capability is being built to enable customers to have live online chats with insurance experts and seek clarifications on their queries
AM: To answer that question, let’s first see the Indian scenario for technology related progress. India’s total number of internet users is 112 million. Mobile penetration has reached 64.7%. Popularity of social networking sites has reached an all time high. The face of the consumer is changing as they are becoming more technology savvy. The amount of data that is available is exponentially increasing, so from a marketer’s perspective, data analytics is becoming the key. Hence technology will become increasingly important for a marketer to define its marketing strategy.
It is very important for organisations to use technology to understand customer preference and behaviour. At Max New York Life, we use technology to track customer complaints online; we have leveraged technology to move from a policyholder to customer view. We have used social media effectively and created a strong online community with 3Lac+ users engaging with the brand and seeking advice online with expert views available to them as well. On the company website, capability is being built to enable customers to have live online chats with insurance experts and seek clarifications on their queries
What are your current marketing priorities & how does that translate to technology?
AM: Life Insurance is a push market. It is sold through consultative sales for long term saving and protection. Our focus is to get our customers stay with us as long as they live, buy more from us and recommend us to their family and friends. Hence, our market priorities are acquisition, retention and cross-sell.
For acquisition, we have used social media platforms to capture customer attention and engage with them on the topics relevant to them through two programmes - igenius and Khyshiyon Ki Planning.
In life insurance, it is important to retain customers for long term as the full benefits of the product accrue with regular savings over a long-term. Through an integrated Customer Value Management (CVM) model we have used advanced analytics to build loyalty programmes for high value customers and Cross-Sell / Up-sell campaigns to generate additional revenues. We have also created a Loyalty programme called the Gold Circle using technology platforms and build a Single view of customer.
For cross selling, technology platforms are used to identify customer with high propensity to repurchase. Cross sell generates 22% of new business of our agency distribution.
At Max New York Life how has technology played a role in customer acquisition or retention?
AM: We have a robust social marketing platform through igenius and Khushiyon Ki Planning forum. Over 14 Lac children registered over the last 2 years from over 1000 cities across the nation and Rs 3 Cr. worth of scholarships awarded so far. The Khushiyon Ki Planning facebook page has more than 1 lakh members. These efforts have provided us leads for customers and have also helped in brand building in the online medium. Retention is important because Life Insurance is a long customer life cycle industry and full value of a policy cannot be extracted by customer/industry otherwise. We have used technology for robust data analytics and SAS models for predicting behaviour of customer for retention and deciding on appropriate action. We have also used a single view of the customer for servicing them effectively so that we can have long term relationship with the customer.
How has technology played a role in new product development, market expansion or other areas?
AM: For the Life Insurance Business, it is imperative business to stay in sync with market changes and get real time analysis of customer trends, consistent benchmarking of key customer attributes across the organization and higher returns on per unit information.
For research we have Online feedback panels (OFP) that are mainly digital extensions of proprietary Research Panels that allow us to stay in touch with a select group of customers, for tracking effect of ongoing changes, that may result from initiatives taken by the company, or other external sources. OFP also helps in faster turnaround time – ideation and deployment to analysis of results is accomplished in days and at times in hours. It also helps in deeper insights into trends – tracking perception choices of separate customer segments.
Would you say the level of collaboration between the CMO and CIO in your organization was:
AM: Technology has become a major dimension of marketing. At Max New York Life, the collaboration between the IT and marketing team is extremely good. We are just a phone call away. Both teams work in tandem and there are many processes currently under revamp or being launched. We have uniform focus of collaborate for customer led innovation.
For igenius programme, we need extensive resources from both marketing and IT to work together from online registration stage to video conferencing. The programme is in its third year and we have never faced any problems in implementing and execution of the project.
About Anisha Motwani: Anisha brings with her over 20 years experience in building consumer brands in highly challenging environments. During her career in advertising and marketing she has developed memorable and effective campaigns across a range of industries. Anisha joined Max New York Life in 2007 and is responsible for Brand & Marketing, Research & Insights, Customer Value Management, Corporate Affairs and Direct Sales.
Anisha has been recently conferred the ‘Women at Work Leadership Award’ for 2011 Asian Confederation of Business. She has also been voted as one of the ’50 Most Powerful Women in Indian Business’ by Business Today for three consecutive years from 2009. She has also been recognized as ‘CMO council – Marketing Super Achiever’
AM: Life Insurance is a push market. It is sold through consultative sales for long term saving and protection. Our focus is to get our customers stay with us as long as they live, buy more from us and recommend us to their family and friends. Hence, our market priorities are acquisition, retention and cross-sell.
For acquisition, we have used social media platforms to capture customer attention and engage with them on the topics relevant to them through two programmes - igenius and Khyshiyon Ki Planning.
In life insurance, it is important to retain customers for long term as the full benefits of the product accrue with regular savings over a long-term. Through an integrated Customer Value Management (CVM) model we have used advanced analytics to build loyalty programmes for high value customers and Cross-Sell / Up-sell campaigns to generate additional revenues. We have also created a Loyalty programme called the Gold Circle using technology platforms and build a Single view of customer.
For cross selling, technology platforms are used to identify customer with high propensity to repurchase. Cross sell generates 22% of new business of our agency distribution.
At Max New York Life how has technology played a role in customer acquisition or retention?
AM: We have a robust social marketing platform through igenius and Khushiyon Ki Planning forum. Over 14 Lac children registered over the last 2 years from over 1000 cities across the nation and Rs 3 Cr. worth of scholarships awarded so far. The Khushiyon Ki Planning facebook page has more than 1 lakh members. These efforts have provided us leads for customers and have also helped in brand building in the online medium. Retention is important because Life Insurance is a long customer life cycle industry and full value of a policy cannot be extracted by customer/industry otherwise. We have used technology for robust data analytics and SAS models for predicting behaviour of customer for retention and deciding on appropriate action. We have also used a single view of the customer for servicing them effectively so that we can have long term relationship with the customer.
How has technology played a role in new product development, market expansion or other areas?
AM: For the Life Insurance Business, it is imperative business to stay in sync with market changes and get real time analysis of customer trends, consistent benchmarking of key customer attributes across the organization and higher returns on per unit information.
For research we have Online feedback panels (OFP) that are mainly digital extensions of proprietary Research Panels that allow us to stay in touch with a select group of customers, for tracking effect of ongoing changes, that may result from initiatives taken by the company, or other external sources. OFP also helps in faster turnaround time – ideation and deployment to analysis of results is accomplished in days and at times in hours. It also helps in deeper insights into trends – tracking perception choices of separate customer segments.
Would you say the level of collaboration between the CMO and CIO in your organization was:
AM: Technology has become a major dimension of marketing. At Max New York Life, the collaboration between the IT and marketing team is extremely good. We are just a phone call away. Both teams work in tandem and there are many processes currently under revamp or being launched. We have uniform focus of collaborate for customer led innovation.
For igenius programme, we need extensive resources from both marketing and IT to work together from online registration stage to video conferencing. The programme is in its third year and we have never faced any problems in implementing and execution of the project.
About Anisha Motwani: Anisha brings with her over 20 years experience in building consumer brands in highly challenging environments. During her career in advertising and marketing she has developed memorable and effective campaigns across a range of industries. Anisha joined Max New York Life in 2007 and is responsible for Brand & Marketing, Research & Insights, Customer Value Management, Corporate Affairs and Direct Sales.
Anisha has been recently conferred the ‘Women at Work Leadership Award’ for 2011 Asian Confederation of Business. She has also been voted as one of the ’50 Most Powerful Women in Indian Business’ by Business Today for three consecutive years from 2009. She has also been recognized as ‘CMO council – Marketing Super Achiever’
Food for thought - IMPACT, 4th March 2012
As a young girl, I clearly recall the family eating out sessions. They were occasions that you would dress up for. In fact I still clearly recall the kind of anticipation that surrounded “the event”.
Ajmer at that time had only one restaurant called ‘Honeydew’. What is interesting is that I vaguely recall what we ate but what I most certainly recall is the kind of time we, a family of four siblings and our parents, spent with each other. A good three hours is what our ‘eating out’ experience was. We would go out early evening. Starters in the lawn and then we’d move indoors. Easy conversation flowed, jokes floated around and sometimes it was plain ice breaking (after sibling quarrels). But yes we had great times, times that each of us still cherish.
Somehow the eating out experience seems to have changed a great deal in India. Over years I think we all have become very approach oriented about most things and sadly eating out is also a part of it. Indians have most certainly changed. Our lifestyles are better, we go to fancier restaurants, know what to order, know what dress codes should be followed but what we seem to be missing is the entire experience of eating out. We all seem to have evolved a very tick and go kind of an approach.
Eating out today is big entertainment. You ask most people what they like doing and eating out, more often than not figures in the list. It’s almost like a hobby to a lot of people. In fact numbers only substantiate what I thought was a trend I’d been noticing.
Visiting restaurants is now one of the top three leisure activities for most Indians, according to the Indian Leisure and Entertainment Report 2008-9 (Knowledge Company)
The Food Franchising Report 2009 said, “The concept of eating out is surely catching up in India. Compared to 2.7 times a month in 2003, urban Indians now have a repast outdoor six times in a month.” And the figures are for 2008 which most certainly must have gone up. In fact the report goes on to say that the retail food sector in India is likely to grow to $150 billion by 2025.
Today when we go out, we book the best restaurants, dress up better but then the eating out experience seems to have shrunk by quality and quantity if you look in the real sense. People go to restaurants, take a nice table, and look impatient if the waiter hasn’t arrived. And when he does, they will quickly order, wait for the meal. The time in between which was earlier a great window to catch up on family things seems to have been gobbled up by our precision type attitude. Another conversation killer seems to be mobile phones. Either the husband or the wife or sometimes the children are on the phone. If they are not talking, they are showing pictures or videos on the phone to friends, if they are accompanying the eating out entourage. Once the food arrives, it’s a quick meal and we are off. We seem to have evolved a very result oriented approach to most things. And I’m all for result oriented approach but not everywhere. Family lunch/dinner for example I think is absolutely not the place for being result oriented.
The idea should be savouring the experience, enjoying conversation, catching up on the small but important things in life that we might have missed out on. For example what your daughter’s teacher had to say about girl’s fancy dress or how your son is enjoying his cricket lessons? Or simply telling your children about experiences from your childhood. And sometimes it can be inane family jokes. But the idea should be to bond. In fat thanks to our approach, even restaurants seem to have caught up with our 'eat and leave ways'.
I’m sure you have noticed impatient waiters hovering over your table if you haven’t ordered a few minutes after you’ve sat down. Compare that to restaurants and cafes abroad where it is considered rude to have a waiter hovering around.
Let’s get the beauty of family outings back I say. A simple thing to do for example would be ordering a starter or drinks that help you can enjoy longer conversations. Have a relaxed meal and yes, don’t forget to share a sinful dessert together. Life like they say, is in little moments.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)